Chef introduces Superfood menu at Milton restaurant

Four years ago, at age 37, Chef Tony DiRenzo began training in mixed-martial arts,and found he was slow to recover. He researched super-foods and developed a unique diet full of nutrient-rich foods and supplements that help him keep up with younger fighters.

Anthony DiRenzo, Executive Chef at Milton’s Abby Park restaurant, said growing up in what he describes as an “old-school Italian family” inspired his love for cooking.

“Food was a big deal, I could come home, even now, at midnight and my mother, she’d get up and cook me something,” he said, sitting at one of the back tables at Abby Park.

DiRenzo learned to have patience with food from watching his mother preserve tomatoes in the summer for cooking the rest of the year and painstakingly cure her own proscuitto.

Though he didn’t realize it, he was learning that self-delaying gratification is the heart of discipline, and discipline is key to everything DiRenzo does.

Four years ago, at age 37, he began training in mixed-martial arts at the Easton gym of professional fighter Joe Lauzon.

As an older fighter, DiRenzo found he was slow to recover. He researched super-foods online and developed a unique diet full of nutrient-rich foods and supplements that help him keep up with younger fighters.

“I’m very disciplined in my food habits,” DiRenzo said. But he encouraged others to take the long view of dieting, noting the best diet is one you can stick with.

“If you’re dieting and you splurge, just go back to your diet, that’s something it took me a long time to learn,” he added.

DiRenzo introduced elements of his diet into Abby Park’s Superfood Menu, giving customers plates that are balanced and inviting.

The Yellowfin tuna crusted with sesame seeds and topped with cucumber ribbons is a rewarding texture combination.

Both it and the salmon provide healthy cuts of fish, a major part of DiRenzo’s diet, with a vegetable on a bed of organic brown rice.

The superfood vinaigrettes, mangosteen for the tuna and goji berry for the salmon, add flavor and pack an extra nutritional punch, which is nice because sauces and dressings often detract from a dish’s healthfulness.

For DiRenzo the menu is just a variation on Abby Park’s central theme of what he calls “modern American comfort food.”

His food discipline is part of what allowed him to walk into his first amateur fight at age 39 and knock out his opponent, 12-years his junior, in the first round.

Though he lost his only other fight on a judges’ decision, mixed-martial arts is at the core of his healthy lifestyle.

“Tony is one of the most even-keeled chefs I’ve ever worked with,” Abby Park owner, Vance Welch, said.

“I’ve met some of the mixed-martial arts guys and they’re not what you’d expect from watching the fighting,” he added.

Page 2 of 2 - Welch said DiRenzo has had them over to watch fights at Abby Park. He said he was a little surprised to find they were polite, professional “health freaks” who didn’t drink much or get rowdy.

Though DiRenzo designed the kitchen, Abby Park opened with a different executive chef. He couldn’t wait for Welch to wade through hurdles obtaining a liquor license, but now Welch said DiRenzo is the restaurant’s “culinary rebirth.”

“It’s funny how it all ties together,” Welch added, reflecting on the way DiRenzo’s life as a fighter dove-tails with his work as a chef. It’s taken patience for it all to come together and DiRenzo can tell you that takes discipline.